Better ways to spend this cash (From Bournemouth Echo)

Better ways to spend this cash

10:13am Friday 10th August 2012 in Letters to the Editor

I TRAVEL by car from Strouden Park through Kinson to reach my destination, Blandford .

On arrival I am greeted by a town full of vibrant colours from the many pedestals containing summer bedding plants.

I contrast that with the grey hues and lack of colour from the parts of Bournemouth I have left or passed on the way.

I thought this might have to do with lack of money, although the sums are quite trivial compared with the losses on the surf reef .

But then I recall that Bournemouth Council was able to whistle up £127,000 simply to celebrate the passing of the Olympic Torch through the town three weeks ago! Which, in my view, was a waste of money.

Sour grapes? Possibly? But then I grew up in a generation not used to all the media hype that surrounds public events today.

And to anticipate any unfair comment, let me say that together with a friend – still alive – we cycled from Blandford and celebrated the 1948 Olympic Games held in this country by completing in one day a 130 mile cycle ride around the Isle of Wight.

So all credit to the winners of UK gold medals.

But the real test of the success of the Games will come from how far it leads to an increasingly inactive population taking up regular physical activity;even by cycling past the imaginative floral display in such places as Kinson or Strouden Park.

Dream on!

GORDON CANN Craigmoor Avenue, Bournemouth